Winter roused by Coventry’s first half ‘hot spell’

COVENTRY held out in an edge-of-the-seat finish to secure their second win of the season and end Bedford’s unbeaten start in a rousing encounter at Butts Park Arena.

The hosts scored 21 points in a devastating nine-minute spell in the first half as they built a 29-7 lead, but Bedford steadily clawed their way back to have the home side hanging on in the closing stages with a man in the sin bin.

It was the response Coventry director of rugby, Rowland Winter, was looking for after Sunday’s defeat at Cornish Pirates.

“There were things we needed to work on from that, being clinical and taking our chances, and we had a hot spell of about 15 minutes in the first half when everything we tried came off,”Winter said.

“That’s the Coventry we want to see consistently.

“We made things difficult for ourselves as the second half went on and maybe we tired a bit in thought with the six-day turn round, but we’d asked for a response and for the large part we got it.

“A win against a top four side like Bedford is pleasing and gives us a lot of confidence going forward.”

Jake Sharp, making his Coventry debut against his former club, kicked an opening penalty, but Bedford responded with a try wide out on the right from Jamie Elliott which was well converted by Ed Coulson.

Coventry regained the lead towards the end of the final quarter when Bedford overthrew at a line-out and the home side countered for Andy Bulumakau to race through between the posts, Sharp converting.

Coventry added two more tries in quick succession to leave their visitors reeling – powerful breaks by Ben Nutley and then Jack Ram setting up Tom Kessell and Tony Fenner for scores with the Bedford defence in tatters, and Sharp converting both for a 24-7 lead.

Kessell burrowed over in the left corner for his second try on 34 minutes on the end of a long break by Tom Jubb as Coventry continued to find space, but Bedford closed out the half with a Ryan Hutler try and conversion and penalty from Coulson to get them back in the game.

Adam Peters claimed Coventry’s fifth try midway through the third quarter.

But, as the penalty count mounted against Coventry, Bedford pushed forward relentlessly and tries from Hutler and Harry Davies cut the gap to a single score with Tom Voss in the sin bin and Coventry defending for all they were worth.